Local Architecture: Cincinnati

Goodbye Glencoe

2013-03-19T21:42:00.000-04:00

Glencoe Place, mentioned often on this website and others focusing on urban decay in Cincinnati, is in the process of being demolished. After a decade of failed

Urban Landscapes Exhibit

2012-10-11T11:56:00.001-04:00

Betts House Photography Exhibit Part of FOTOFOCUS Cincinnati, OH – Urban Landscapes, on view at The Betts House October 13 - November 29, 2012, will feature the work of photographers Sherman Cahal, Zach Fein, Craig Moyer, and Ronny Salerno. An opening reception will be held Friday, October 12, 5-8 pm. A gallery talk with some of the artists will take place on October 27 at 2:00 p.m. The images

Inside Union Terminal

2012-07-09T08:30:00.005-04:00

Union Terminal is one of Cincinnati's most iconic buildings. Aside from being one of the best examples of Art Deco architecture anywhere in the world, Union

The Ammo Plant

2011-05-03T03:39:00.003-04:00

This abandoned complex has been featured on the blog once before, almost a year and a half ago. I won't go too far into the history of it, since it's been covered before, and is also covered in great detail over at Abandoned. Two of my favorite photos ever taken came from here, so I only hesitated a bit when given a chance to photograph it again. This trip took place on one of those rare

If You Missed It, Forgotten Cincinnati

2011-03-13T17:09:00.021-04:00

The Third Annual Forgotten Cincinnati Exhibit was a big success. Hundreds of fans of Abandoned Online, Queen City Disco, and Local Architecture came by for the opening. While some photos are still on display at Joseph Williams, several pieces have sold. If you didn't get a chance to see the photos, the gallery below contains the photos that were featured and on display: (or click here for a

St. George Fire

2011-02-01T16:21:00.002-05:00

Three years ago today, a work light that had been left on accidentally caught a curtain on fire in one of the steeples of the old St. George Church on Calhoun Street. In the hours that followed, the fire spread to engulf one steeple, and the wind carried the flames over to the other. The two steeples that had towered over Clifton for 135 years burned for several hours on the freezing cold

The Glencoe Hole

2011-01-24T12:00:00.001-05:00

Glencoe Place was the subject of the first post on this blog. Over the past five years or so, I've been to Glencoe frequently, mostly because I live close, and also because it's pretty easy to drive through and show people an "example" of the types of places I like to explore. The old post has as much historic information on Glencoe that I could find, so I won't get into that here. Instead,

Third Annual Forgotten Cincinnati Photography Exhibit

2011-01-12T15:01:00.013-05:00

The Photography of Local Architecture: Cincinnati will be part of the third annual "Forgotten Cincinnati" exhibit. The show debuts on Friday, January 28, with a special opening from 6 - 9 PM. Forgotten Cincinnati features the urban decay photography of Sherman Cahal of Abandoned Online, Ronny Salerno of Queen City Disco, and Zach Fein of Local Architecture. The exhibit debuts at two

The Best Abandoned Building in Cincinnati

2011-01-09T19:30:00.003-05:00

2007 and 2010, respectively, in the Crosley Building There are a lot of abandoned places in Cincinnati. The abandoned subway is clearly the mother of them all, and despite being the most fun to explore (no matter how many times I do it), it's not quite my favorite. It's so tightly locked up and untouched by outsiders, that it's exactly the same every time I go. Over the past four years,

First Annual Cincy Urbex Calendar

2010-11-27T19:20:00.002-05:00

Just in time for the holidays, the first annual Cincinnati Urban Exploration (Urbex) Calendar is now on sale! The calendar includes photos seen here on Local Architecture as well as photos from our friends at Queen City Disco. It's only $19.99, and makes an excellent present for the holidays. Check out the preview below: As digital calendars and mobile devices are

House With a View

2010-11-15T09:00:00.108-05:00

Fellow explorer Lance DeLune and myself have had our eyes on this smaller residential building for some time. Built in 1875, it's similar to many of the buildings found throughout the Over-the-Rhine area of Cincinnati, except for its location midway up the steep hillside adjacent to the neighborhood. The building sits on an isolated street, most of the other buildings around it have been torn

Rooftops

2010-08-19T22:41:00.021-04:00

Blog posts have been few and far between this summer. I've been working a lot, at an internship in New York City, and there really aren't a whole lot of abandoned buildings here. What there are a lot of, however, are rooftops. While rooftops aren't abandoned in the traditional sense, they are within the realm of forgotten space. With the exception of a roof garden or deck here and there, most

Abandoned Buildings & Street Art

2010-06-24T21:36:00.003-04:00

I personally don't contribute to the street art scene, but the architecture I'm interested in and the photographs I enjoy taking are intertwined with it, as most of the photos on this blog have shown over the years. There are plenty of people who sneak around abandoned buildings, subways, tunnels, etc. but the largest (and most vocal) two groups are those who are there to take photos, and those

Porkopolis Square

2010-04-27T01:15:00.007-04:00

Porkopolis Square is a fictional skyscraper being constructed somewhere in Ohio. Climbing a real skyscraper would probably be a fun, but extremely dumb thing to do. Besides, here at Local Architecture our correspondents usually just sneak into old abandoned buildings. Sneaking into 600 foot unfinished skyscrapers isn't our business. They would probably have unclimbable fences and security

Local Architecture Goes to New York

2010-03-31T23:55:00.002-04:00

Despite my considering Cincinnati my life long home, I've been spending half of my life the past two or three years in New York at various internships as part of my undergrad, and now my graduate degree in architecture at the University of Cincinnati. Last week I moved back, and this time it's for quite awhile.. I'll be living in NYC until September. In other words, Local Architecture won't be

Cincinnati Subway

2010-03-08T03:30:00.006-05:00

The Cincinnati Subway is by far the most famous abandoned subway on the planet. It's also one of Cincinnati's most infamous landmarks, and aside from randomly scheduled and extremely expensive tours, no one ever gets to see it. Conveniently, it's a stones throw away from the Local Architecture headquarters. So myself and Gordon Bombay from Queen City Disco decided it was about time to make a

30 Feet Below Cincy, or 600 Feet Above it?

2010-03-03T08:00:00.003-05:00

It's a tough choice; I couldn't make it myself. Which update would you prefer to see first? On Saturday night at midnight, whichever choice is leading determines what adventure will be posted on both Local Architecture and our friends over atQueen City Disco.

The Viaduct

2010-02-16T08:00:00.004-05:00

It's not abandoned yet, but the Western Hills Viaduct is crumbling beneath the thousands of cars it carries every day. The City of Cincinnati is planning to spend millions over the next five years, however, for a rehab and/or replacement plan. Sadly, the billions upon billions of dollars being spent on the I-75 Mill Creek Expressway Project and the Brent Spence Bridge Replacement/Rehab Plan

Cincinnati North Hotel

2010-02-09T02:00:00.003-05:00

The building formerly known as the Cincinnati North Hotel is a prime example of one of the grandest architectural products of the 1980's. Sike. It's actually an extremely ugly perversion of modernism; it's the look of modernism on the outside, with none of the thought process behind it. It's such a goofy looking place, that I had to see it. So on a single digit winter night in the frozen

Fox 19 Coverage

2010-01-29T10:48:00.004-05:00

For those who missed Gordon Bombay and myself on Fox 19, they've uploaded the video to their website. Check it out below to hear a bit from the guys behind the photos:

Urban Exploration on TV

2010-01-28T02:18:00.017-05:00

Mainstream media is abuzz with excitement about "urban explorers." After a great article by Quan Truong at the Cincinnati Enquirer, interest in this site, and the site of our good friend Gordon Bombay at Queen City Disco grew quite a bit. The AP picked up the story and newspapers like the Boston Herald, The Examiner, USA Today, and even the Dayton Daily News ran the story as well. Anyways, the

Local Architecture: Forgotten Cincinnati Exhibit at Final Friday

2010-01-17T16:39:00.006-05:00

The Photography of Local Architecture: Cincinnati will be part of the exhibit "Forgotten Cincinnati," that debuts on Friday, January 29. Forgotten Cincinnati features the urban decay photography of Sherman Cahal, Ronny Salerno, and Zach Fein. "Forgotten Cincinnati," is an exhibit that features a collection of photographs from Sherman Cahal's Abandoned Online, Ronny Salerno's Queen City Disco,

German Reformed Church

2010-01-05T12:00:00.004-05:00

Aside from the decline of industry in the US, the declines in both population density and church attendance have left behind another architectural remnant of the past: churches. The interior of a German Reformed Church in Cincinnati's West End. While the abandoned churches of Detroit are amongst some of the largest and most beautiful works of architecture forgotten by the modern world,

The Romantic Aesthetic of Abandonment

2009-12-15T08:30:00.006-05:00

The following is a selection from my architecture thesis proposal. Industrial sites like the one at Duisburg-Nord on the left, and INAAP on the right serve only temporary functions, but gain a distinct aesthetic because of that reality. Across the internet, in galleries, and in published works an interest in urban decay photography has grown over the recent past. This is indicative of the

Army Ammunition Plant

2009-11-26T09:00:00.003-05:00

Nature meets industry as overgrown brush grows into one of the massive, abandoned coal-fired Power Plants at INAAP. There is no official ranking of the largest abandonments in the country, so I will call this 10,000+ acre World War II era ammunition plant the largest abandonment in the country because I can. Built in 1942 to support the US efforts in WWII, the plant continued to produce